


Color Coordinated

by flipomatic



Category: The Owl House (Cartoon)
Genre: Character Study, Gen, Manipulation, Odalia is a Bad Parent, The Blight Twins growing up
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-15
Updated: 2020-12-15
Packaged: 2021-03-10 18:21:10
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,714
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28081575
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/flipomatic/pseuds/flipomatic
Summary: Edric and Emira were born fraternal twins. Their mother couldn't control that, couldn't make them identical, but she could match their colors. She could control everything else.
Relationships: Edric Blight & Emira Blight
Comments: 10
Kudos: 58





	Color Coordinated

**Author's Note:**

> I wrote this instead of working on Internship, don’t tell anyone. This is something I’ve been mulling over since the AMA where Dana said that Odalia likes her family color coordinated.

Emira was eight years old. She didn’t have many cares in the world, besides making sure her brother didn’t hog extra time with the training wand. Her magic was just starting to develop; she needed that time too! She wasn’t sure what kind of magic she wanted to do yet, there were so many options.

Other than that, she wasn’t preoccupied by much. School was easy, Mittens was big enough to play properly now, and there was always something to do.

Today, that something to do wasn’t nearly as exciting or interesting as Emira wanted it to be. Over breakfast that morning, Mother said that they would be hosting a party in the evening. All of the most influential members of coven leadership would be there, so they needed to be on their best behavior.

Ed protested that he was always on his best behavior, which of course wasn’t true. He had lost his temper over a failed spell just the day before and hid away in his room until Mother forced him to go to dinner.

“Your _best_ , best behavior.” Was how Mother had replied to him, emphasizing the first best. Ed said he got it now, and that he would. Emira chimed in that she did too, and Mother smiled at her.

It filled her with happiness, seeing that smile. Emira almost never got to see it.

Later in the afternoon they got ready for the party. Mother had picked outfits for all three of the kids. Mittens got to wear a green dress, one that matched Mother’s hair color. She looked adorable in it. Once Mittens’ outfit was all set, she sat down in a chair in the corner to read a book.

For Emira and Ed, they were dressed in black with dark purple accents. The suit Ed wore was nice, but didn’t match him at all and as soon as it was on he started tugging at the collar. Emira was standing on the other side of the room, where she had been admiring her dress and earrings in the mirror. She liked them, they made her feel older than she was.

“Can’t I wear something else?” Ed asked with a pout, moving to take the jacket off. Emira looked over as a firm hand on his shoulder stopped him.

“No.” Mother spoke firmly, her hand remaining in place. “You may not. You will match with your sister tonight.” She was dressed up as well, in the purple of her coven.

For a moment Ed sagged, before he perked up with an idea. “I could match with Mittens instead!” Emira shook her head frantically at him; that had been a mistake.

As expected, Mother’s eyes narrowed, her expression darkening. “What have I said about calling your sister mittens?” Her volume had come down as she wielded the words like a weapon in his ear.

To Ed’s credit, he kept his composure. Emira wouldn’t have been able to. “To not do it. I’m sorry.” His expression hardened as he locked in his emotions, since showing weakness would only bring more scolding.

“Good.” Mother released his shoulder and straightened up. “The answer is still no. Your outfit matches wonderfully with Emira’s. Come here darling.” She addressed the last sentence to Emira, who was still watching from a healthy distance.

Emira approached as directed, stopping in front of her mother. “It’s not that bad.” She looked Ed over from head to toe. It wasn’t that big of a deal that they matched.

“Thanks…” Ed muttered in reply.

“The two of you look splendid together.” Mother grasped her hands together as she looked between them. “Guest are arriving in an hour; I’ll come fetch you when it’s time.”

Mother left a minute later, leaving the kids to their own devices. Immediately Ed flopped down onto the ground, arms and legs crossed. “Can’t believe this.” He grumbled.

Emira leaned over to better talk with him, but didn’t join him on the floor. Her new dress would get dirty if she did. “You’ll survive; it’s just for one night.”

“I’m gonna die.” Ed countered, flopping his feet forward.

Emira just shook her head. “You won’t.”

He collapsed back onto the ground, staring up at the ceiling. “We’ll see.” He said, before closing his eyes. Emira rolled hers, then stepped around him to check on Mittens. She was still reading, undisturbed by the commotion around her.

Watching Mittens read was boring, so Emira left her alone and got a deck of cards. She had just learned how to make card houses from one of her friends, so that’s what she started to do. When Ed noticed, he joined her. He seemed to enjoy knocking the cards down more than building them up though, so she banished him to build his card house on a different table.

An hour later, Mother came back to get them. She fixed Ed’s hair, which had been ruffled when he lied on the ground, and scolded him for messing it up. Then she took the three kids to the party.

It was being held in the ballroom of the house, which Emira almost never went to. On most days, it was off limits. The huge room had a high ceiling with chandeliers. When Mother led the kids in, there were already a few witches inside. All of them were in fancy clothes, some even fancier than what Mother was wearing. Many of them glanced over to see who had entered, but looked away when they saw who it was.

Mother took Mittens’ hand in hers. “You’ll be staying with me.” She said to her youngest daughter, before turning to the twins. “Stick together, only speak when spoken to. Remember, your _best_ , best behavior.”

“Yes Mother.” Emira responded for both of them; she knew Ed wasn’t in the mood to.

“Your Father and I will be around, if you need us.”

With that, Mother walked away with Mittens in tow. This left the twins free to wander the party.

“Where’s the food? I’m starving.” Was the first thing out of Ed’s mouth. He lifted a hand to use as a visor as he looked around, trying to spot something to eat. Emira looked around too, until she spotted a table with some small food items on it.

“Over there.” She pointed, drawing Ed’s eyes in that direction.

“Score.” He said, immediately starting to walk that way. Emira trailed after him, and then joined him in making a plate of appetizers. They were almost too short to reach the table properly, but the tongs helped them still grab far away food.

With food acquired, they walked around and ate. It was pretty good food, though Emira didn’t know what half of it was.

They had walked about half way around the room when an adult called their names.

“Edric, Emira? You’ve grown so big I almost didn’t recognize you.” A witch, who was standing with a small group of other adults, was calling to them. “Come over here, let me get a good look at you.”

Emira glanced at Ed, who was looking at her. They didn’t have much of a choice. Mother wouldn’t approve of avoiding guests.

The twins walked over to the witch, looking up at her beaming face. She had a full necklace of pearls around her neck.

“Oh, you two are so adorable in those matching outfits!” The witch practically cooed over them, with a drink in one hand. “How old are you now?”

“Eight!” Ed was always excited to share his age when asked.

“I swear they grow up so fast these days.” The witch chuckled, and then introduced the other witches with her. They included a coven leader, along with a few higher ranking members of other covens. Emira couldn’t be bothered to remember or even listen to their names.

After a few minutes, the witch freed them from the conversation. The twins moved on to continue walking, but were soon trapped in a similar situation again.

Throughout the evening, they engaged in many of these forced conversations. They were complemented on how much they looked like their mother, on their developing magic, and how well their outfits matched.

When the twins were dismissed to go to bed, the event was still in full swing. Mittens was sent upstairs with them, so they could put her to bed.

As soon as they were out of the ballroom, Ed took off the suit jacket.

* * *

Emira was eleven years old. She had quite a bit more to worry about than she had when she was eight, most important of which was what track she wanted to join at Hexside.

Since the new school year had just started, witches in her grade had to pick which pre-track to join. This would determine their track in a few years, and then their coven when they graduated. It was a big choice, one Emira was excited to make.

At school, they spent the whole first month of the year learning about the different tracks. At the end of the unit, each student received a pamphlet to take home. All of the tracks were listed inside, along with information about the kind of magic they learned and careers in the covens. Both Emira and Ed got one.

When the twins got home, they sat down in the kitchen to read it over. Mittens asked if she could read one too, so Emira told her she could have it after a decision was made.

Then Mother got home from work. When she saw what pamphlets they were reading, she stopped dead in her tracks.

“Is it that time already?” She asked, speaking again before Emira could reply. “Hand it over.” She held out an open palm, expectantly.

Ed gave her his without a word, but Emira hesitated. “We need these to pick a track?” It wasn’t intended as a question, but it sounded like one coming out of her mouth.

Mother frowned sharply. “Not these ones.” She said simply. “Don’t question me.”

“I’m sorry.” Emira complied, passing her the pamphlet. She would have to apologize to Mittens later, since she wouldn’t be able to read it.

“Thank you.” Mother flipped through a few pages of the pamphlet, before saying she’d be right back. She vanished into the house, returning a minute later. She was still carrying paper, but it looked completely different that the pamphlets Emira and Ed had given her.

“Here, choose your track from these.” Mother gave each of them a new handout, which consisted of about 10 sheets of paper stapled in the corner. “Let me know when you come to an agreement.”

She wanted them to join the same track? Emira would’ve asked for clarification, but she’d just been instructed not to question Mother.

That didn’t stop Ed though. “Agreement?” He repeated the word, confused.

“Yes. Agreement. If you don’t, I will choose for you.” Mother’s response didn’t really answer the question. Regardless, she then left them in the kitchen, having to go talk with Father.

Emira looked at the new handout. It was printed on regular paper, in black and white. The cover said “Blight Track Guide” in bold letters.

When Emira flipped to the next page, she could see that it featured a lot less tracks than the pamphlet she got from school. In fact, there were only three options in this one: illusions, abomination, or oracle.

This was not a lot of choices. Across the table, Ed was balking at the paper.

“What track are you thinking?” Emira asked, with the fact that they would have to pick the same one weighing over the question.

“I wanted to do beast keeping.” Ed frowned, flipping quickly through the handout. “Looks like that’s out.”

Emira sighed. “Yeah, Mother won’t approve of it.”

Ed threw the papers onto the table. “I don’t care then, let’s just pick at random.” He crossed his arms, glaring at the offending handout. He probably didn’t mean that.

Emira looked back down at hers. “I don’t know.” She said, flipping to the next page. “What about illusions?” That had been one of her preferred choices from the start.

“Hmm.” Ed mulled it over, tilting his head from side to side. “I don’t hate it.” He declared after a few seconds. “But I don’t like it either.”

“It could be fun.” Even though Ed said he didn’t hate it, Emira still tried to convince him a little. “Plus, according to this it’s the most versatile of all the tracks.” She poked her papers insistently.

Ed slowly picked his handout back up, flipping to the same page Emira was reading from. “Yeah, fine whatever.” He said, though he was actually reading the information now.

Emira kept reading the handout, taking notice of the information about potential careers for each track. It was very different than the ones in the previous pamphlet. The papers from the school had focused on a wide variety of jobs for each coven, while these ones only listed high ranking coven positions.

The two ended up sticking with illusions. So that was settled, though it wasn’t a decision either of them was truly happy with at the time.

Mother though, when the twins told her, was thrilled. She told them how impressed she was that they were able to decide, and how good they were going to look in their matching blue sleeves.

* * *

Emira was fourteen years old. She mostly ignored her worries, as that was a great way to remove them. Sure, nothing was actually solved that way, but she no longer had to be concerned with them. It was easier to run.

In school, to avoid her problem of being bored out of her mind, Emira often cut class. As it turned out, the illusion track had been a great choice. It was easy to leave illusions in her place, ones the teacher couldn’t see through, and roam the school. Ed cut class with her; it was boring to wander the halls alone. Sometimes they even snuck out of school, but that was hard to pull off.

They were almost never caught. Only their best illusions teachers could see through the mirage, so once they learned who couldn’t be fooled they had to stop skipping those classes. Other teachers though, especially the ones for shared subjects, were much easier to trick.

Even when the twins did get caught, their punishment was light. Principal Bump would send them back to class, with the only punishment being a call home to their parents.

Emira doubted that he actually made those calls, since Mother never mentioned the few incidents to her or Ed.

Today was one such day. Emira had sent an illusion clone to class for her, with instructions to take notes so she would have them later. Unfortunately, this spell took more magic to keep up so she couldn’t do any other spells. When she and Ed were spotted in the stairwell by another teacher, there was nowhere to hide.

The teacher took them to the principal’s office, where they were seated in front of Principal Bump.

“What am I going to do with you two?” He asked, eyes flicking from Emira to Ed.

“I think-“ Ed started to say, but Principal Bump interrupted him.

“That was a rhetorical question.” Principal Bump maintained his usual calm tone. He reached for his office phone, lifting the receiver to his ear and dialing a number. Emira assumed it was ringing, though she couldn’t hear it.

“Hi, Odalia do you have a minute?” Oh, that was Mother’s name. A chill ran down Emira’s spine as she glanced over at Ed. He had turned pale. “I’m sitting here with your twins, caught them in the halls during class again.” He paused for a moment to listen. “No. No. Alright, have a nice day.” Principal Bump hung up the phone.

He looked at it for a few seconds, mouth in a straight line, then turned to the twins. “Get back to class. Your teachers are expecting you.”

Emira couldn’t bring herself to feel happy about being released, not after hearing that phone call. She had to yank Ed to his feet to get him out of the office. They walked slowly back to their classes, dreading what would happen when they went home. Mother was going to be furious.

When she got home later, Emira had decided to not bring up the events at all. She hoped that if she didn’t talk about it, then it wouldn’t come up and maybe Mother would just forget about it. She got Ed on board with that idea, albeit reluctantly. He said there was no way it would work, and that it would be better to just tear off the bandaid. Emira disagreed; the bandaid could be ripped off later.

Much to both of their shock, Mother didn’t bring up the call from school when she got home. She didn’t mention it at dinner either, and Emira had to elbow Ed to remind him not to. The evening passed without incident, without mention.

Emira wondered if Principal Bump actually had been calling home, with this as the true result. Why wasn’t Mother upset with them?

Ed counted it as a blessing and said he didn’t want to know. Emira was curious though, but she didn’t want to bring up the subject.

A week later, the Blight Family was getting ready to hold a party. They held a few a year, to bring the most powerful witches together under their roof. Emira and Ed had been attending them since they were very young.

Mother had picked out white and blue accented outfits for them to wear, which they were required to do without questions. Emira put hers on a couple hours before the party; she wished it was accented with green instead.

Well, with an illusion spell she could make that happen. She’d been getting very good at casting illusions, especially simple ones. This kind of spell, just to change the color of a small part of the dress, wouldn’t take much effort to maintain.

Emira tried it out in her room, casting the spell carefully. It had the intended effect, changing the accents green instead of blue. It didn’t look as good as it would’ve if they were naturally that color, but it was better than the blue. She let the spell fade for the time being.

When the party started, Emira recast the spell before heading down. Ed was waiting for her in the hallway, not wanting to go into the party alone. He raised an eyebrow when he saw her. “I like what you’ve done with it.” Was what he settled on.

“Thanks.” Emira brushed her hands over the dress, smoothing it. The illusion held under her touch.

They went downstairs to the party together. Mittens was already there, staring at Emperor’s Coven members with wide eyes. She didn’t notice their arrival, but somebody else did.

The twins barely made it ten steps into the ballroom when Mother materialized next to them.

“Emira, dear.” Her voice was like ice in Emira’s ear. “Please speak with me in the hall.” Her tone was polite, but carried distinct displeasure. Uh oh.

Ed was allowed to continue into the room, while Emira had to follow Mother out to the hallway. They continued to one of the study rooms, where Mother shut the door behind them.

“You will disable that illusion spell immediately.” Mother said as soon as the door was shut.

“I think it looks nice like this.” Emira liked the way the dress looked now.

Mother spoke firmly, each word clear and low. “It does not matter what you think.”

Emira crossed her arms. “I think it does.” She insisted. She was tired of always matching Ed; it was nice to wear something different.

Mother closed her eyes and took a deep breath, inhaling and exhaling slowly. When she was done she reopened them, still narrowed sharply. “Why do you think Principal Bump doesn’t punish you for skipping class?” She changed the subject abruptly, throwing Emira off balance.

“I’m not sure.” Emira replied, trying to think of a reason. “Probably because my grades are good.” She was in the top quarter of her class.

“Wrong.” Mother started walking slowly, tracing a half circle around Emira. “It’s because I ask him to. It is by my good graces that you stay out of detention, or worse, and yet you dare to defy my wishes.” She was behind Emira now, her voice causing the back of Emira’s neck to tingle. “I don’t have to protect you.”

So she was interfering at school, likely to maintain the family reputation but also to set up this exact situation. To gain leverage over her eldest children, like she had been their whole lives. It had taken a while, but Emira was starting to catch on.

In the moment, Emira had no choice. “I understand.” She said, dropping the illusion spell.

Mother finished walking around her, examining the dress that was now in its original state. “Wonderful.” She said, with all of the hardness in her expression slipping away to be replaced with a small smile.

Emira no longer felt warmth at that smile, only bitterness.

Mother led her back to the party, dropping her off with Ed.

“You lived.” He commented once Mother left them alone.

“Barely.” Emira muttered under her breath in reply.

He offered her a plate of appetizers. That helped.

* * *

Emira was sixteen years old. Her stresses had increased over the last couple years, though pranks helped her cope with them. They were harmless pranks, just for fun.

When she turned eighteen and joined a coven after graduating, she planned to move out of the Blight Manor. She’d talked about it with Ed, and he was in too. They could rent a place together, at least to start.

Anything would be better than living under the roof with their parents.

As an act of rebellion, they decided to dye the tips of their hair a darker shade of green. Mittens helped them pick the color. This was in protest of Mother, of her control over their lives.

Of course, even in protest they still matched. That dark green was still color coordinated.


End file.
